The beach Vliehors is an 8-sq-mile (20-sq-km) sandy plain, exposed to the North Sea, along the west side of the Dutch island of Vlieland. The Vliehors Expres carries visitors the length of the beach, leaving wonderful poems in the sand. Or you can visit by bicycle, as we and many others did.

Below are trip highlights from October 22, 2019 on Vlieland, Netherlands. Click any image for a larger view, or click the position to view the location on a map. And a live map of our current route and most recent log entries always is available at mvdirona.com/maps.

Ferry Position: 53°17.78’N, 5°5.36’E The entrance channel to Vlieland Jachthaven is 52 ft (16m) wide, about the length of Dirona. It felt fairly tight when we came through, especially with the strong cross-current at the entrance. So we were amazed to see the 180ft (55.97m) ferry Terschellinger Bank inch through. The vessel’s beam is 41ft (12.71 m), leaving only five feet on each side as it entered. This sounds adequate, but that boat really plugged the gap.

Bicycles Position: 53°17.78’N, 5°5.36’E Lubricating our bicycle chains before a bicycle tour of Vlieland. Those Giant FCR 2s have served us amazingly well over the past decade, requiring surprisingly little service given the amount of use they get and the difficult conditions they’re stored in. These bikes have never been spent more than a decade on the deck of an ocean-going boat. Helping them along with this amazing feet, we do store them in a canvas bag on the flybridge.

Riding Position: 53°18.02’N, 5°4.74’E Vlieland, as with everywhere we’ve visited in the Netherlands, is very bicycle-friendly with many dedicated cycling paths. Here we are initially riding on the road, but automobile traffic is light and everyone gives cyclists plenty of room. We had a really fun day.

Horses Position: 53°18.13’N, 5°3.28’E Horseback riding is popular on Vlieland—we saw many fields of horses as we biked around.

‘t Badhuys Position: 53°18.26’N, 5°3.00’E A delicious lunch beach-side at ‘t Badhuys on Vlieland.

Vliehors Position: 53°17.01’N, 4°59.41’E Looking east along the beach Vliehors, an 8-sq-mile (20-sq-km) sandy plain along the west side of Vlieland exposed to the North Sea.

Vliehors Expres Position: 53°17.01’N, 4°59.41’E The Vliehors Expres, carrying tourists on a trip across the Vliehors.

Tracks Position: 53°17.01’N, 4°59.41’E The Vliehors Expres left a poem in the sand reading “Wat de diepste indruk maakt werd door water aangeraakt. Door geen mens gestoord neemt de zee het laatste woord” (“What makes the deepest impression was touched by water. No one disturbed by people, the sea takes the last word.”) It’s super-creative to carve poems backwards into their large tires.

Posthuys Position: 53°16.07’N, 4°58.14’E On such a warm day for late October, we couldn’t resist stopping for a drink outside on the patio at the Hotel Posthuys.

Birds Position: 53°15.35’N, 4°56.34’E Seabirds and tidal pools at the western end of the Vliehors with the restless North Sea as a backdrop.

Kroon’s Polders Position: 53°15.45’N, 4°56.82’E The four small polders (low-lying land reclaimed from the sea) of Kroon’s Polders were constructed in the early 1900s to prevent heavy storms from breaking the island in two. They’re no longer drained and now are an important plant and bird breeding area, supporting over 60 bird species.

Click the travel log icon on the left to see these locations on a map, with the complete log of our cruise. On the map page, clicking on a camera or text icon will display a picture and/or log entry for that location, and clicking on the smaller icons along the route will display latitude, longitude and other navigation data for that location. And a live map of our current route and most recent log entries always is available at mvdirona.com/maps.